Upgrading to Windows 11, An Odyssey

I currently have two PCs running Windows 10 that can't be upgraded to Windows 11, and with Microsoft recently sunsetting Windows 10 it was way past time for me to get a new machine, so I did. It's state of the art and I love it, but it's brought about a whole new set of challenges for me.

Both of my existing PCs, a desktop and a laptop, are old and tired, and between the two I have about a terabyte of docs, pics and videos, plus all kinds of old outdated software, so I wanted to start fresh and combine everything into one system running the latest software. Easy, straightforward plan, right? Mostly.

In preparation for the cutover, I copied all of the data I wanted to keep from both PCs to an external hard drive and then started to set up the new laptop. Microsoft makes things relatively easy to set up a PC now, if you want to play by their rules. I, however, do not, and herein lies the problem. I wanted to set the new PC up with local accounts, and they make that awfully hard to do these days. They want you to sign into new PCs with your Microsoft account, there's no local account option anymore, at least not any that are easily accessible, and they want you to live and play in the cloud. No thanks, not a fan. I don't want all of my data being sucked up into the cloud for a multitude of reasons. Number one is privacy, you really don't want things like your tax docs and medical records floating around in the ether. Number two is that I have way too much data, it would cost me a small fortune per month to store a terabyte of data on OneDrive, so I planned accordingly and got a PC with a huge solid state hard drive. Reason number three is that I like to be able to use my PCs offline, I don't want to be dependent on network availability to access my stuff. Three strikes and you're out, so it's local accounts for me, and OneDrive gets turned off.

To accomplish this in Windows 11, you need to interrupt the OOBE (Out Of Box Setup Experience) at just the right moment with a "shift - function - F10" keystroke, that apparently takes more finesse than I possess, but I finally got it to work after a couple of reboots. This key sequence brings you to a command prompt and from there you need to enter: Start ms-cxh:localonly This command causes the PC to reboot and allows you to set it up without a network connection and create local accounts. Of course, Microsoft fights you the whole way with annoying little pop-up suggestions like "Log in to your Microsoft account to get the full user experience", and "You're not protected, let us back up your files and settings". Doesn't matter that my data is still nowhere near the new computer, I'm just "not safe" by their way of thinking. So frustrating.

Anyways, I got past all of that and created two local accounts: an admin account for installing things and a standard user account for everyday use. I've found that this is the best method for protecting your device, if you accidentally download malware while on the user account, it can't install without you raising your privileges by logging into the admin account. It's a nice little safety valve.

Next, I started removing all of the bloatware that comes on a new PC, this is important to do before you install the things you really want and need. Case in point; Microsoft puts a trial copy of Office onto all new machines and because I purchased a full copy of Office Home edition, it had to go. You would think the Office installer would take care of things like that, but it doesn't, and you can't do a clean install of Office until you remove it, so I did. I also got rid of, or hid, a bunch of other non-essential crap, and changed all of the settings to my liking. Making progress!

The next step was downloading and installing my new copy of Office Home 2024. I thought this would be pretty straight forward as well, but surprise; it is not.

Office 2024 requires you to be logged into your Microsoft account to both install and use it. This means that even if you're set up as a local user and you've purchased a full copy of Office, you need to be logged into Microsoft whenever you use Office products. It also turned OneDrive back on, backed up my settings and files, and it used my Microsoft credentials to log me into Edge; "get points and bucks for your search data!" Again, no thank you. Frustration levels rising...

Easy fix though, I went back into OneDrive and turned it off, again, amid more protestation, and I logged out of Edge. This still leaves you logged into your Office products and able to use them, so I'm good with that to some degree. There was a small benefit to this extra step they forced me into; when I logged in it triggered the Windows 10 ESU (Extended Service Updates) and my old machines started receiving patches again, so I guess letting it back up my settings and files on a relatively empty machine was worth it. I was shocked at how fast it glommed onto my new machine and backed it up unbidden though, but it is what it is. It is nice to have a little protection on the old devices while I cut over.

Office wasn't done surprising me yet, though. I told you it's been a long time since I'd upgraded, so long that my old copy of Office came with Outlook, and that's no longer the case. You can only get a full copy of Outlook with the Office Business Edition now. With the Home version, you need to download "New Outlook", which is part of the Office 365 suite and is a web-based product. Why I would want to install Office 365 on top of my full copy of Office Home still eludes me, although Microsoft suggests that it will make all of my other devices more productive... The layman's translation to that is that they want access to all of your phone's data as well. Speaking of access to all of your data, New Outlook wants you to give Microsoft permission for them to access all of your contacts and emails. I don't know about you, but I have hundreds of business, personal and organizational addresses, and it would be wrong for me to hand that data over to a third party, it would be a breach of trust. My provider already has access to it, why would I give it to someone else just to use a third-party mail client? Not gonna do it, wouldn't be prudent.

I do like to have an email client though, as it allows me to combine all of my accounts into one view and it also gives you more features and flexibility than webmail alone. After a little research I've narrowed it down to a couple of options to replace Outlook. I'm currently experimenting with eM Client as an alternative. So far, so good, I'll keep you posted as I plod along. I really wish that there was an Apple Mail app available for Windows, it's got them all beat for privacy, functionality and ease of setup in my opinion, but there isn't.

One more tip before I wrap this up, and this is important; if you're an iTunes user, you are much better served going directly to Apple's website and downloading the Windows 64 bit version of iTunes instead of installing the Apple Music, Apple TV and Apple Devices apps from the Microsoft store. When you install the apps, you can have a really hard time syncing your devices, especially if you still have any iPods. The Apple Devices app, which you need to manually sync any Apple device, including iPhones, has some awful ratings, some mentioning bricking of phones. The Apple TV and Apple Music apps themselves both work fine, but when either one is installed, they eviscerate iTunes, turning it into a podcast and eBook only shell of itself, and forcing you to download the third app, Apple Devices, for synching, and that's just too risky for me. I'm not using any 1-star rated app to back up and manage my phone. There are literally thousands of reviews from unhappy users about the Apple Devices app for Windows. Stay away, stay far, far away.

So, this exercise in modernization and consolidation has turned into a GIANT project for me, but I've learned a lot. It doesn't have to be so difficult for you though, if you want to roll with the program and set up as a "cloud first device". That's just not what I want, and when I pay this much money for a whole new setup, I want some say in the matter. I understand Microsoft's reasoning, they're basically giving you the Windows OS for free, and making their money from subscription services and packaging deals. Personally, I'd rather pay for my software and own and use it as I see fit. One thing I've learned is that nothing is free in the IT world, you either pay cash money for something, or you pay with your personal information, and in my opinion, your PI is much more valuable than money these days. It's a conundrum we all have to face in this digital age. 

At the very least, it would be nice if they gave you the option to set the machine up locally without having to break out of the setup. If you're not aware of this requirement beforehand, it's a difficult thing to recover from, and that's their thinking, I guess. It feels slippery and disingenuous to me, and I'm really glad I did my homework before I unboxed. An opt out for OneDrive would be greatly appreciated as well, it's annoying and frustrating. The average user isn't going to deviate from the network centric setup, only the fussy old users like me, so they wouldn't be losing any revenue. It would just be the right thing to do. 

Don't get me wrong, I really love my new machine and some of the new features. Windows 11 is streamlined and fast, and not that hard to get used to, all things considered. This latest crop of machines is amazing.as well, so this isn't a Microsoft or big tech hit piece, I just feel that it's important that they know we want, and need, more input into our own setup processes and PI management.

OK, I'm done grousing for now, I've droned on long enough. Stay tuned though; I have some updates and reviews coming up of the actual system I ended up going with, as well as a few apps I'm test driving. First, I'm gonna go take a couple Tylenol and lie down for a while...

Email Client Not Downloading Messages

 

Like many of you, I have multiple devices and multiple email accounts, so I use email clients to keep everything organized and available locally. I use Outlook 2013 on my Windows devices, and the standard iOS mail app on my Apple devices. All clients are configured the same to access my providers POP3 and SMTP servers, and all was working well, except on one platform, my Windows desktop. Messages were sending, but Outlook was hanging up when downloading new messages. It would sit and spin on "downloading" for hours, if I let it. Every so often a few emails would download, but it was a painful and incomplete process.

This was a vexing problem because mail was sending on the device, and occasionally, messages were downloading, so everything appeared to be set up correctly, plus the problem was limited to this single device. Hmmm. 

First thing I did was verify a good network connection for the desktop, which was easy for this device, it's plugged directly into a Gig port on my router and upload and download speeds were optimal.

A comparison of email account settings across devices was next, to see if I could find any differences, and I did.

When I first set up my email clients, I used all of the same settings, except on the desktop. The difference was that I had the Outlook 2013 client on my desktop set to "Leave a copy of messages on the server" and I had also checked "delete messages from server after 14 days", a subcategory, as well. On all of the other devices I had only checked "Leave a copy of messages on the server" and hadn't checked any of the deletion options. I had done this so that I could keep my mail server account effortlessly clean, while not missing any messages on any of my devices. My thought, a valid one, was that 14 days before deletion would give me enough time to be sure that I had received all of my emails on all of my devices before they were deleted from the server, and it worked, for a while...

When I unchecked "delete messages after 14 days", my new emails started flowing fast and furious on the desktop, just like on all of my other devices. Nice, like poop through a goose, as they say. Problem solved.

But why was this setting causing me problems? After all, it's something email clients are designed to do. Well, I did a little research and here are the major reasons "Deleting messages from the server" will fail:

A large volume of emails on the mail server can strain both the server and your device, causing freeze ups. Yep, that's me.

Server Issues. This is probably part of the problem as well. My original provider sold my email domain and address to another provider, and that new provider would most definitely not be my email provider of choice, if I had a choice, but I don't. I want to keep my current domain, that email address is ingrained into everything in my life, and I'm not ready to rip it out by the roots and throw my life into turmoil at the moment. Hint: my "new" provider is famous for the phrase "You've got mail". Nuff said?

Outdated or buggy email apps. It's probably time for me to upgrade Outlook 2013 to Outlook 2024, but I'm also in need of upgrading my PC's so that they can run Windows 11, so... I'll wait and do it all at once. *sigh*

Incorrect server settings. They were correct across devices and should have worked. Harumph. 

Slow or poor internet connection. Not my problem, man.

So, "Deleting messages from the server" was the issue that was hosing up my desktop, for a number of reasons, all stated above. To fix this in Outlook, go to "Email Account Settings", highlight the account you want to change, then click on "Change", "More Settings" and "Advanced". At the bottom of the advanced box, make sure that "Leave a copy of messages on the server" is checked, and that all of the subcategories that delete files from the server remain unchecked. It should look like this when you're done:

For now, I'm managing deletions on my mail server using the webmail interface from my provider. It's kind of painful; I'd prefer that it happened automagically, but it's a work around until I can clean up my mail server, and upgrade Outlook. There is another benefit to using Webmail occasionally btw, managing your spam filters at your mail server instead of on your individual devices is a much better solution in that constant battle with spam. Win, win.

One last thing, a friend was having the same issue with their Apple email client on their iPhone, messages either not downloading, or taking forever and then downloading in fits and starts. This same fix worked for them, so this problem is not unique to Outlook.

I think we all need to clean up our inboxes a little... 

That is all. 

Apple iOS/iPadOS 18.3 update - Security, Performance and Email Issues

 The iOS 18.3 update was chock full of surprises, not all good, and from the chatter I'm seeing online, I'm not alone in that opinion. It was a frustrating experience to say the least. Most notably for many, the mail changes were the worst part of it. Mail in iOS 18.3 now automatically categorizes your inbox for you and only shows you what Apple has deemed important in your inbox by default. You can change it back, kinda sorta, but life is hard enough without Apple making half of your inbox appear to disappear overnight. A change like this needs to be optional, not automatic, but it wasn't, so here's a brief summation of the changes you'll see, and some suggestions to regain order.

First things first though, a new update for iOS and iPadOS, 18.3.1, is already out, and you should install it immediately. It addresses both performance and security issues introduced by 18.3. According to Forbes, it's an emergency patch that fixes a security issue that’s already being exploited, and “an Apple Intelligence bug that may have been introduced.” the iOS 18.3.1 update fixes a flaw in Accessibility where a physical attack can disable USB Restricted Mode on a locked device. “Apple is aware of a report that this issue may have been exploited in an extremely sophisticated attack against specific targeted individuals.” What this means in a nutshell from a security standpoint is that anyone could plug a device or cable into your USB or Lightning port and copy your data, even if your iPhone or iPad is locked. Yikes, this needs to be addressed as quickly as possible.

The 18.3.1 update also fixes recent performance issues introduced with 18.3. So far it seems quick and stable, but the jury's still out. Fingers crossed.

Okay, now let's get to the email "enhancements" that they've introduced. It reminds me of their threads change, Apple seems bound and determined to reimagine email, not sure why, but they are. I’m a straight up chronological inbox guy, anything else tips over my brain. If you're the same, here's what to do.

In the top right corner of your inbox(es), you should see an ellipsis (...), tap on that and change the setting to List View from Category View. This will repopulate your inbox(es) with all of your email messages. If you have more than one email account, you'll need to do this for all of your inboxes.

You can also get rid of those inbox category icons as well by turning off contact photos in Settings/Apps/Mail. They still show up in the emails themselves, but this gets rid of them in the list view. I don't need or want to see stars, moons and clovers anywhere other than in my bowl of Lucky Charms. Note, actual contact photos will still show up in your emails, as do their little category icons, this fix just removes them from your inbox for a cleaner view.

Next, emails that Apple deems "needs responding too" appear at the top of your inbox now. This is a similar fix to getting rid of the contact icons, go to Settings/Apps/Mail, then turn off “follow up suggestions” and they'll go away. Basically, turn everything on that page off except "notify before delete", unless you like living dangerously lol.

There's also a new feature, or bug, in Calendar. After entering a new event, Apple Intelligence picks up on any text messaging or email regarding the event and prompts you with calendar inbox messages. Ideally this is a good thing, but when I enter an event like "Lunch at 12:30 with John Doe", I don't need a message that says "Text from John Doe says lunch at 12:30" in my calendar inbox after I've created the event. It used to prompt me with the text details while I was creating the event, telling me after the fact is just superfluous and annoying. Perhaps the next update will return this feature's usefulness, we'll see.

Lastly, these updates will toggle on Apple Intelligence by default, even if you previously had it switched off. If you'd like to keep it off, go to Settings/Apple Intelligence and Siri, and toggle it off. It's still in beta, so I keep it off. I did turn it on briefly when I test drove one of the new intelligent features, Image Playground. Kinda cool, it generated a pretty funny profile sketch for me that's mostly right. Mostly. Lord knows how intelligent it actually is, and what info it reports out (see bug notice above), so I turned it back off. I'll be sticking with my own lack of intelligence for now.

It shouldn't be this hard, Apple. Offer me things, don't force me to recover from them.

That is all.

Nook Color Firmware Upgrade

Barnes and Noble recently released their long awaited firmware upgrade for the Nook Color, Version 1.2. It’s based on the Android 2.2 OS, and it brings all kinds of new features to the already cool and functional device.

With the addition of Email, Adobe Flash Player and the availability of productive Apps like Quickoffice® software, as well as time wasters like Angry Birds, it’s got the whole package now, and at half the price of an iPad, this device has become pretty hard to pass up.

Check out our previous review of this device for more details.


That is all.


Oh, wait… Angry Birds anyone?

The Fort Myers Area Dunkin' Donuts Now Have Free Wi-Fi!

Old berry has his traveling shoes on, and he's got big news for all you Red Sox Spring Training devotees; the Fort Myers area Dunkin' Donuts now have free Wi-Fi.

The Cleveland Ave. Dunkies has now become a full service pit stop for me on my way to and from the pahk. I can get my large iced coffee, make room for it, and check my email. How cool is that?

Don't be checking your email while you're emptying your tank though. Handhelds don't float...